The MIT Difference: Radiology and Regenerative Medicine with Dr. Jacobson

Season 8 Launch: Dr. Mark D. Jacobson on Interventional Radiology, MIT’s Patient-Focused Imaging, and Regenerative Therapies

Mike Roth introduces Season 8 of Villages Vitality Life, Seniors Life Unscripted (formerly Open Forum in The Villages, Florida), emphasizing activities and health for seniors over 55, and interviews Dr. Mark D. Jacobson, CEO of Medical Imaging and Therapeutics (MIT) in Lady Lake. Jacobson explains medical training and interventional radiology, describing minimally invasive, image-guided procedures such as biopsies, endovascular aortic aneurysm repair, and TAVR. He outlines MIT’s focus on accuracy, precision, and accommodating older patients with implantable devices for imaging. Jacobson discusses newer offerings including radiofrequency ablation for benign thyroid nodules, spine tumor ablation with vertebral stabilization, and his FDA-regulated regenerative medicine approach using quantified, screened human placental proteins (without cells/DNA) and peptide delivery via a Push Patch iontophoresis device. He reports outcomes from 150–200 treated patients and shares MIT seminar and contact information.

00:00 Season 8 Kickoff
00:48 Meet Dr Jacobson
01:51 What Is Fellowship
03:32 Interventional Radiology Basics
05:33 Aneurysm Repair Revolution
07:54 TAVR Explained
09:04 MIT Patient First Approach
12:10 Alzheimers Research Update
12:57 New Procedures At MIT
13:18 Thyroid Ablation Breakthrough
15:53 Spine Tumor Pain Relief
18:00 Regenerative Medicine Basics
19:02 Questions To Ask Providers
20:39 Stem Cell Reality Check
23:36 Beyond Stem Cells
24:00 Proteins Explained
24:43 Placenta Safety Screening
26:13 Why Avoid Stem Cells
28:36 Quantified Dosing Science
31:19 Administration Methods
34:02 Steroids Versus Healing
36:25 Results and Success Rates
40:00 Peptides and Push Patch
42:55 Seminars and Contact Info
43:57 Show Wrap and Supporters

Season 8 Introduction

Transcript

Dolores: 0:23

Welcome to Season 8 of Villages Vitality Life, Seniors Life Unscripted. Our podcast used to be called Open Forum in The Villages, Florida. In this new season, we talk to leaders of clubs and interesting folks who live in and around The Villages. We also talk to people who have information vital to seniors. You will get perspectives of what is happening in and around The Villages, Florida. In addition, in this new season, we will add more information for all seniors.

Mike Roth: 0:48

This is Mike Roth on Villages Vitality Life, Senior Life Unscripted. .In season 8 , I've changed the name of the podcast because we are increasing our emphasis on activities and health for seniors over 55 years of age. I'm here today with Dr. Mark D. Jacobson. Thanks for joining me, Mark.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 1:12

Thanks for having me. Mike.

Mike Roth: 1:13

Mark is the CEO and Medical Imaging and Therapeutics. MIT, is located in Lady Lake. Mark holds board certifications in diagnostics and interventional radiology. A specialist in minimally invasive image guided therapies. For over 30 years, mark earned his medical degree from Wake Forest University Bowman Greys School of Medicine in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Mark completed a general surgery internship at North Carolina Baptist Hospital. His residency was at St. Francis Medical Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He has a fellowship in interventional radiology at the Pittsburgh Vascular Institute with a certification and added qualifications in vascular and interventional radiology. Mark, again, thanks for joining us. And why don't you explain for our listeners what a fellowship in interventional radiology is for those people who aren't familiar with it?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 2:20

Fellowship. Is an additional year or two of subspecialty training above and beyond what is normally. Performed in a residency program. Classically in this country, what happens is one goes through a medical schooling of four years duration. Then some people do what's called an internship, usually in either in an internal medicine field or sometimes in a surgical field. And I chose to go into a surgical internship. After doing an internship, one generally completes a. Residency training. So that's a particular type of specialty. And my specialty was radiology or diagnostic radiology. And one can at that point further specialize or subspecialize into different fields of radiology. There are several pediatrics, neuroradiology nuclear medicine and interventional radiology is, in my opinion, one of the most attractive fields, and it was a kind of a natural choice for me given my surgical background and my curiosity and how things work in the human body and my desire to not only want to help patients establish appropriate diagnoses, but to be able to offer them solutions. So an interventional radiologist is, in essence, a human repair specialist.

Mike Roth: 3:45

Okay. So could you give us an example of what an interventional might be that that Everyone will be familiar with.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 3:51

Sure. An interventional procedure could be something as simple as a biopsy. More importantly, interventional radiology helped to develop most of what we realized today as minimally invasive medicine. So if we back up a step and think about radiology is really one of these transformative fields. Back in the eighties when I was doing my medical training. We used to have to take people to surgery, put them to sleep, and open them up to diagnose various conditions such as lymphoma. And shortly thereafter, with the advent and popularization of imaging modalities, such as CAT scan imaging, basically replaced and obviated the need for people to undergo big surgeries, to establish diagnoses. And so in that sense, radiology is transformative. But interventional radiology really took it up a an order of magnitude and was able to take the remaining or many of the remaining surgical procedures that were left on the table as necessary and transform those into very minimal procedures because we were able to get into the body. With small needles, guide wires, catheters, balloons, and stents, which were pretty much all developed by the early interventional radiologists in the 1960s and seventies, and all of these procedures. Tie back to radiology because they use some sort of image guidance, whether that be live X-rays in the form of fluoroscopy or CT, or nowadays more and more of these procedures have shifted toward ultrasound guidance. So again, interventional radiology has given us the way to get into the body and fix what used to be major problems requiring huge operations. To basically be repaired on an outpatient basis and sometimes even in the office. Probably the best example I could give you would be aortic aneurysm repair. And this is something that we have been working on and started working on in the eighties and early nineties. As a matter of fact, I was involved in some of the early studies and. Participated in some of the first cases done in the United States of percutaneous aortic aneurysm repair. In essence, we took somebody that had an aortic aneurysm and instead of taking them to the operating room and putting them to sleep, we brought them down to the interventional radiology suite. We used live x-ray or fluoroscopy to. Direct guide wires into the disease artery. And we basically fabricated a stent graft, which is basically a hybrid device consisting of some form of fabric, either Dacron or PTFE Teflon that was connected to metallic stents that would anchor the implant inside of the blood vessel and we could deliver basically an aortic graft from a small hole or a couple of holes in the groin without having to open the patient. And that way we were able to achieve something that we take for granted nowadays, which is called percutaneous or endovascular aortic aneurysm repair.

Mike Roth: 7:12

And is that the standard repair for an aorta aneurysm today?? Dr. Mark Jacobson: It has become the Some aneurysms are of course, not conducive based on their anatomy or size or other extenuating circumstances, but the vast majority of aneurysms can be detected early and they can be surveilled with imaging and when they reach a certain critical point is. Rather simple nowadays to go in and fix them. Nonsurgically similarly, back in the nineties. My mentor and I were having a conversation about wouldn't it be cool if we could replace a defective heart valve using this same type of technology? So we were having this conversation in 1993 when I was doing my fellowship in Pittsburgh, and it was a number of years off before that technology became reality. But we have that now on many of our. Patients in this, in, in our own medical community have benefited from this type of procedure. It's currently referred to as a tavr, a percutaneous aortic valve replacement. How do you get that get that big valve through a little vein?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 8:23

All of these things get compressed into a delivery system. And the delivery system is introduced through a small hole, either in the groin or sometimes even in an arm vessel. And again, using image guidance to identify where that graft needs to be placed. The. Delivery mechanism is placed in that precise location, and then the product to be delivered is basically unsheathed. It's usually contained in some sort of a sheath that can be peeled away or gently. Removed to unveil the device that's being implanted.

Mike Roth: 9:00

So it's like a automatic umbrella unfolding when you push the button.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 9:04

It's very similar to that. Yes. And it can be delivered in controlled fashion. So it is operator dependent. A lot of people worry about AI and computers and robots and things like that, but there are still certain tasks that require. Hands-on precision And human guidance,

Mike Roth: 9:23

Right? Mark, why don't you tell us about what the MIT difference is in radiology here in The Villages?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 9:30

So a lot people have the perception that they can go anywhere and just get imaging, and that every imaging center is alike.

Mike Roth: 9:36

That's what I what I thought.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 9:37

And most people do think that because they're going there to get imaging and they assume that they will get some sort of a report that will be accurate and that report will be delivered to their doctor, and then their doctor is gonna go over that with them and tell them what needs to be done. It's a very oversimplified explanation of how things really work and really what has to happen in order to get. An accurate diagnosis is that we need not only to have good high quality imaging equipment, but we need to know how to use it and use it well. So at MIT we're not just an imaging center. We're far from that. We're primarily in an interventional radiology facility that uses imaging to establish diagnoses. And unlike most places where. Speed and throughput are the emphasis and almost the sole emphasis. The emphasis at MIT is really accuracy and precision. ' cause what we're trying to do here is separate signal from noise. And in order to do that, we have to be accommodating to our patients. And because we deal with a large number of older patients that have extenuating circumstances. Many of our patients, for example, have implantable devices. They have stents, they have joint replacements. They have a myriad of electronic devices in the form of pacemakers, defibrillators cardio stimulators. They have spine stimulators, they have bladder stimulators and the list goes on and on. And now we're even seeing patients with, devices that help with sleep apnea.

Mike Roth: 11:15

Oh, really?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 11:16

So all of these devices are many of them have metal. We call MRI conditional But many centers refuse to take the time to do the research to determine that the device can in fact go into the scanner. So we take that time upfront and we try to be very accommodating to our patients because at MIT, we realize that we work for the patient. It's as simple as that. So we have never lost that focus. Our complete focus is on the patient, and if takes a little bit extra time, so be it. One of the reasons I am of this philosophy is because as I get older, I realize that someday I am going to need to benefit from this technology and in, in great, in honesty, I already have. I've been a patient, I've had some spine issues. I've had some, traumatic events and I've been on the other side of the table. So we want there to be a noticeable and palpable difference in our office. From the moment that people set foot into the office, we want everything to pretty much revolve around the patient. And I think for the most part, that does, and that is point of distinction.

Mike Roth: 12:28

Sure. let's take a short break here and listen to an Alzheimer's tip from Dr. Craig Curtis.

DR CRAIG CURTIS AI: 12:34

And these new antibodies in particular, Trontinemab appears to be about 10 to 15 times safer, and remarkably removes the amyloid in about three to four months versus about one year to 18 months in the existing medications. So this is a really significant breakthrough. It's currently in clinical trials. The good news is we're in the final phase. That study began about a month ago in late December, 2025, and we'll enroll approximately 1500 people across the United States and in other countries.

Mike Roth: 13:15

Thank you, Dr. Curtis.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 13:17

Now Mark, in your practice at MIT what is the latest advancements? What are some of the latest advancements that you offer in your practice? As an interventional radiologist, you can imagine that people like myself are always on the lookout to try to bring new and useful leading edge technology to our patients. And as such, some of the things that we've brought on of late are things like radio frequency ablation of thyroid tumors. This is another thing that used to be a big bother to patients with goiters. This is specifically focused at patients who have large thyroid nodules that become obtrusive. They either interfere with swallowing or speech or are just painful.

Mike Roth: 14:00

So take care of a thyroid nodule or assist with radiation from the outside without cutting on the patient.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 14:09

It's a little different than that, so we're not really radiating anything. We do a number of thyroid biopsies in the office. Many people do, but, as I said, if we have a patient that has a large or bothersome thyroid tumor that is benign we have the technology now to basically stick a small probe into that nodule. Using ultrasound, using live ultrasound guidance, and we can energize that probe using radio frequency energy to basically excite the tissue and molecules inside the nodule to create a thermal reaction to kill the nodule without disturbing or destroying any of the surrounding healthy thyroid tissue. So once again, this is a type of procedure that has been thoroughly researched. It's not new in the sense of, oh, it was just invented yesterday. As a matter of fact, it's been out and been in use in other countries. For about 10 years. So there's an extensive amount of experience with this in other countries, and there's a lot of research that's been done, and it is a procedure that is a proven efficacy. So this is another point I wanna stress. We're not just looking for new things, but we're looking for efficacious and worthwhile things to offer our patients. It's not, just about doing the latest and greatest. And but it's about adding value. This is very important to me. It's it's not about just doing something, it's about doing things with a purpose. So we have obviated the need for thyroid surgery in many patients by offering radiofrequency thyroid ablation. Can you do that radio ablation on other organs in the body?

Mike Roth: 15:52

like BHP? Dr. Mark Jacobson: Yes. Radiofrequency ablation has been used extensively to treat cancerous tumors in various parts of the body, liver tumors, and other types of soft tissue tumors. I use radiofrequency ablation and have for the last decade to treat spine tumors. So one of my sincere passions for the last 26 years has been dealing with patients who have spine fractures. It's a common problem in the older population. And many of my patients are not only osteoporotic, but many of them have osteoporosis and cancer. And unfortunately, some patients will develop metastatic bone lesions. Which not only weaken their bones and cause fractures, but are extremely painful. And my emphasis, my purpose for offering this type of procedure is to give patients quality of life. Now, I can't look anyone in the eye and honestly tell them that I'm going to prolong their life because I have no idea how long they're supposed to live. But let's face it, if I have the opportunity to. Bring a cool little procedure out of my bag of tricks that doesn't really require a whole lot of time and effort. And I can impact and a patient's quality of life. why not? So 10 years ago, I started doing spine tumor ablation, I do that in conjunction with vertebral fracture repair. So this gives me the opportunity to go in to a patient's. Spine using a needle guidance. Usually under local and conscious sedation. So no general anesthesia, it's just an in-office procedure. Takes about 30 minutes to an hour and basically I can go in through a small hole, get a biopsy so I can prove what's going on there. And then I can go ahead and do the tumor ablation. And once the tumor ablation is complete, I can. Basically in instill some bone cement into the defective vertebra and stabilize it and restore structural and load bearing integrity to the spine. That's a very interesting procedure from several perspectives. Can you tell our listeners, How you've incorporated A medical regimen into your practice?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 18:19

Regenerative medicine is another newer field that is of great interest to many people and many physicians. And unbeknownst to most people in the United States, regenerative medicine is a field that is. Present and regulated by the FDA in the United States, so everything that has to do with regenerative medicine. Happens with FDA oversight and involvement and regulation most importantly. Now, there are a lot different components within the field of regenerative medicine and there are a lot of confusing and misunderstood parts. I'll do my best to try to simplify it here and also give you a reason as to why I am offering this in my practice.

Mike Roth: 19:05

All you have to do is open up the Daily Sun, and you see all kinds of strange ads and seminars. And and in this season eight, we're going to explore more of them. Mark what's the first thing that should be aware of in in regenerative medicine?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 19:22

The message I want to convey is that best patient. Like the best consumer is the informed patient, and I would urge everyone who is considering using regenerative medicine or benefiting from regenerative medicine to do their research and do their homework and ask whoever is offering them regenerative therapies, a list of basic questions.

Mike Roth: 19:47

The first question would be?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 19:48

What is it? Where does it come from? and Is it legal? If they can not get satisfactory answers to these questions , then they should probably avoid it altogether. So those are some of the basic questions. Everybody of course, wants to know what it costs, but costs are relative. And I think that what one needs to understand most importantly is what is it? Where does it come from? Is it quantifiable? This is a very important question. How do we know exactly what is in there? Is somebody just making claims that are unsubstantiated?

Mike Roth: 20:24

Yeah. is it a

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 20:25

Is it third party verified? Is there an independent organization, like consumer reports or another independent lab that goes behind Entity that's producing the product, that is doing their own independent testing to verify the contents also verify not only the ingredients, but also the amount of ingredients that are in there. We don't want to pay for a pound and get three ounces.

Mike Roth: 20:53

And the first thing that people see in the Daily Sun or other media might be stem cell therapy ranging from a couple of thousand to $25,000. What is your opinion of stem cell therapy?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 21:07

What can tell you about stem cell therapy is that it varies across the board. Everyone's understanding of stem cells is different. Stem cells do exist. They come from a multitude sources. As a matter of fact, we produce our own stem cells, and the problem that I see in. My demographic here is that as we age, the number and potency of our own stem cells diminishes. So if we are taking product from our own body and trying to concentrate it and give it back one probably needs to be aware that there's not gonna be a substantial response.

Mike Roth: 21:48

So we're starting out with a low amount and we're concentrating the low amount into a small amount. And we're not gonna get much benefit.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 21:56

Precisely

Mike Roth: 21:57

From our own stem cells.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 21:58

The take home message here is also that autologous products, meaning product, products that come from our own bodies do have some advantages, but they are slim. The biggest advantage that I can think of with autologous products is. We're not going to give ourselves any communicable disease, right? We're just taking a product from our own body and we're spinning it down and concentrating it and giving it back. And the FDA says that's perfectly legal because they give it what we call a same surgical site exemption, meaning that we can take anything from our own body and process it however we see fit. And as long as it's being given back to ourselves, that is okay. Autologous products like PRP, which many people here in this community are doing platelet rich plasma. There's some other products that come off platelet rich plasma and platelet poor plasma. And some people combine the platelet rich plasma with some calcium chloride and they call it platelet rich growth factor. And are a bunch of different things, but those things can basically all be considered as autologous products, meaning that they come from ourselves.

Mike Roth: 23:09

Isn't that just table soil?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 23:11

It's pretty much a it's creating a different flavor.

Mike Roth: 23:14

So the platelet  rich plasma or PRP infusions, let's call it. I have never heard of one of my acquaintances or friends here. Tell me. I had that and it was terribly successful. I've had the other conversation.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 23:29

I think I can echo what you are saying, Mike, and we understand why that is. We're taking a product of poor potency and we're expecting miracles. So we're over promising and underdelivering and these product.

Mike Roth: 23:43

Is there a better way there?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 23:45

There are better ways and

Mike Roth: 23:46

I will get to that momentarily. I,

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 23:50

definitely want to tell you that science has shown us that stem cells are not even a necessary part of the equation because science has shown us now that the stem cells are not really. What is essential to getting the work done? It is the ingredients that stem cells basically are the transporter of. So we're looking for active ingredients. And the active ingredients are proteins.

Mike Roth: 24:16

Proteins.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 24:17

And the proteins basically fall into three categories. They're micro, RNA, growth factors, and, cytokines and these proteins are found in a number things. They're found in PRP. They're found in stem cells, they're found in amniotic products. They're found in umbilical cord products. And for many years now, there's been a lot of research done on human placenta and we are finding now that we can get all of these proteins in much greater quantity much better potency from the human placenta than from any of the other products that we've mentioned so far.

Mike Roth: 24:56

Okay. I've heard that there are problems with human placenta proteins. If the woman was exposed to the COVID vaccine,

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 25:06

There can be. And you're absolutely right Mike, and I appreciate you asking that question because, again, one if we digress for a minute to those questions that you asked me that people should ask one of the things is where does it come from? And what I can tell you about the human placental protein that I work with is that it comes comes from thoroughly screened US donors. So these are women that are here in the United States that have to document about a 20 year history of having no cancer, no communicable disease, and they also cannot have spike protein positivity, nor can they have received the COVID vaccine.

Mike Roth ai5: 25:44

What's a spike protein?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 25:45

The spike protein is the protein that the COVID virus uses to. To attach to ourselves. So when we are infected with the COVID virus or we've received a vaccine, we test positive for that spike protein. So all of the prospective or potential donors. In United States that would want to qualify to donate their placenta, have to test negative for the spike protein, and they cannot have received COVID vaccine. 'cause COVID vaccine is made from micro RNA and it's of concern that micro RNA could splice its way into our own DNA and create problems downstream. The things that we're concerned about most with stem cells. Because of the cells and the presence of DNA is genicity. In other words, are we going to basically stimulate some cancer that's growing dormant in our bodies?

Mike Roth: 26:43

And we all may have a dormant cancer cell too, in our body.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 26:46

I think that's a given, and hopefully our body's defense mechanisms are functioning well enough to keep those cancer cells in check and to destroy them before they have a chance to become. A real problem. But as I said, one of the biggest concerns with regenerative therapy using cells and DNA is genicity. And because stem cells, especially mesenchymal stem cells, which are, the ones that seem to be advertised the most. They are what we call pluripotent. So they can not only bring about tissue repair and growth and things like that, but they have a distinct potential to stimulate tumor growth.

Mike Roth: 27:29

So you're working with. Peptides.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 27:32

I'm working with human placental protein and peptides. So the human placental protein basically is all of the active ingredients that would be in stem cells but more, way more than what we see in stem cells. 'cause typically stem cells come from a particular lineage. They come from, typically one of three germ layers. And the beauty of going back to the human placenta is that the human placenta makes everything that's necessary to sustain human life from conception to birth. And all these proteins that come from the human placenta come from all three germ layers. So they come from the endoderm, the ectoderm. The mesoderm. So they have the ability to heal any and all different tissues, nerve tissue musculoskeletal tissue, connective tissue mucosa, anything in the body. So it's a complete complement of proteins. But the important takeaway message here is that we can get the pure proteins without cells and without DNA.

Mike Roth: 28:37

Okay. How would that be administered? 'cause I've seen that stem cell therapy is administered through an injection, whether it's in your knee or in your rear end into a muscle. How do you administer peptides?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 28:49

Let me go back to the placental proteins, because the proteins I think it's a two-part question, right? The proteins can be used and are used in my practice in place of stem cells. Why is that? Because they are produced here in the US. I know exactly where they come from. I know what's in there. Proteomic analysis shows me. Every one of the 300 plus proteins that is in every sample, all of that has been third party verified. And for the first time in the regenerative world, we have something that is quantifiable. And I think this is extremely important for people to understand that without the ability to measure, we don't have science. When people go for stem cell therapies, we have no idea what is actually in the stem cells that they are receiving. Nobody does the analysis and figures out what's in those cells and it can be quite variable. And here, since we are have basically done away with the cell we are just dealing with the constituents and we know exactly what's there and it's sold by weight, not volume. So we actually have a product that. Can be quantified and we can give it in a metered or standardized dose. And this is very important for science because without the ability to measure, we don't have science. And if we're not giving a standardized dose of whatever it is that we're administering, how should we know what type of response to expect?

Mike Roth: 30:13

How do you know what size of a dose a person would, need?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 30:16

It varies by condition. And this is where basically customization. Comes into play. It depends on whether somebody I'll just use the example of a musculoskeletal injury that I treat frequently. Let's just say a partial rotator cuff tear. This is a common injury here in The Villages because we have a lot people that golf and play pickleball. And many people don't want to have unnecessary surgery if they can avoid it. Because the surgery is the easy part. They can sleep through that. But recovery requires a whole lot of time and effort, generally speaking about, about six months from a shoulder surgery. So if they can avoid the surgery and do regenerative medicine, I think they're all in. And this is where I say buyer beware. you can forego the stem cells, which are not 50 state legal, and we don't really understand what ingredients are there, and you just skip the cells and go directly the active ingredients. And do that. I think not only do you have a better chance of recovering quickly, but you have peace of mind knowing that you're not putting DNA and cellular material into your body, which can potentially create havoc in form of awakening some dormant cancer that we may not even be aware of.

Mike Roth ai5: 31:32

Okay, what would the administration of that product look like?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 31:36

So the product actually comes lyophilized. So it's freeze dried in a small glass vial, and it gets reconstituted. That's another one of the beauties of human placental proteins. They don't they're shelf stable. So they don't need to be kept in some sort of a deep freeze. And they have two year still shelf stability.

Mike Roth: 31:55

And what they come to you?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 31:56

In a little glass vial and they get reconstituted. They can be reconstituted with sterile water or sterile saline. Some people even use hyaluronic acid to reconstitute them, but most of the time I use sterile saline. And it's very simple because. Every medical office has access to sterile saline and what we're left with is an aqueous or clear liquid substance that could be administered in a myriad of ways. So if somebody comes in with that rotator cuff tear or a meniscal tear, we can give it directly into the joint. We can also treat people systemically, so we can give it intravenously. It can be administered. Into the subarachnoid space, so right next to the brain and spinal cord through a small needle that we would use to do a spinal tap or a lumbar puncture. We do that in patients that have certain neurologic conditions like MS. Or Parkinson's disease, 'cause we want to get a substantial. A dose of the protein across the blood-brain barrier. that's the easiest way to get it to cross the blood-brain barrier. So it, it has a lot of versatility and it's very easy to administer. It's very well tolerated. There really haven't been any reported adverse reactions to human placental protein. And the only thing that we've noticed is that patients who are considering. Receiving this type of therapy should come off of anti-inflammatory medications and immune modulators in order to allow the proteins to have the maximum effect.

Mike Roth: 33:28

Anti-inflammatories, things like Tylenol, Motrin.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 33:32

Mostly things like Motrin, ibuprofen, aspirin that type of thing because

Mike Roth: 33:37

Okay. And what was the second thing? You mentioned.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 33:40

Immunomodulators. Some people are on medications. The immune suppressants, immunomodulators things like corticosteroids would be a good example. We have a lot of patients. In this community that take chronic steroids many of them are taking those medications for various types of arthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, arthritis prednisone. Many people take those types of drugs too because they have back pain. And what we're finding is that the. Placental proteins work very well in place of the steroids. This is, this has been one of the interesting reasons why I've tried to shift some of my focus toward regenerative medicine. I've come to realize over the years that a lot of the therapeutic agents that we use in our typical practice are merely band-aids. They mask symptoms and they control conditions for a while, but they don't really allow the body to fix itself.

Mike Roth: 34:38

No healing.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 34:38

Correct. As a matter fact, when I give somebody an epidural steroid injection, I have to counsel them. I have to tell them your blood sugar is going to go up, so if you're diabetic, keep a close eye on that. I have to also warn. My osteo product patients that, the corticosteroids are going to weaken their bones, especially over prolonged use and corticosteroids are directly toxic to bone. So we try to steer away from that whenever possible. And also corticosteroids can and do. Retard healing. So many surgeons who are contemplating surgery on patients will tell them, come off of the steroids, or Don't get a steroid injection before I do your surgery. Because of two things. They the steroids not only slow down the healing process, but they compromise our immunity so they will increase the potential for infection following procedure.

Mike Roth: 35:32

So I've heard a lot of people here in The Villages getting steroid shots for their back. Their knees And And The story was that you could only take two or three of these a year.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 35:42

Correct. . Yeah. Part of that is insurance driven obviously, but the other side of the story, if you will, is that we realize that these are harmful and deleterious substances and they need to be used sparingly.

Mike Roth: 35:56

How long have you been using these peptides?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 35:58

I've been using the placental protein array now for a little over two years. As I said, there's 20 years of research on human placental proteins and all of the constituents have been very thoroughly researched. So we know what all of the different proteins do. The placental proteins initially became available to a very elite subset of the population about five years ago. So the initial patients that were treated with the placental proteins were NFL and NHL players. Okay. so you've ever seen people get tackled on the football field on a big , they go down hard, and then you wonder why two weeks later they're back in the game. And now we know what the secret is.

Mike Roth: 36:38

Okay, So you've treated approximately how many patients

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 36:41

I've treated somewhere in the neighborhood of 150 to 200 patients in the last couple of years with placental proteins.

Mike Roth: 36:48

So for our listeners, give them a quick summary of the 150 or so that you've treated how many have had. No reaction at all.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 36:59

When you say no reaction, talking about they had no improvement.

Mike Roth: 37:02

Yeah. Their underlying condition did not change.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 37:05

I think a small percentage. I would say probably 10 to 15% of people might have reported no improvement. But what we do find that some people. Under report things because they're simply not aware that they have had an improvement. we have brought patients back into the clinic for follow up. Let's just use that example of a rotator cuff injury. 'cause it's a common one here. And so I've injected people that have had bilateral rotator cuff injuries. and we're unable to effectively use the dominant arm very well. So they start using their non-dominant arm. And all of a sudden they come in and they realize or they don't realize, they say we're not really noticing too much improvement when we bring 'em into the office, we see. Now they're able to raise their dominant arm and they can actually, comb their hair or brush their hair or do things that they were previously unable to, but they just didn't realize it.

Mike Roth: 38:04

Okay. So it's unreported success.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 38:06

Correct.

Mike Roth: 38:07

Okay. What percentage would you say of the 150 people had dramatic improvements that they reported to you?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 38:16

I would say that 70, 75% have had dramatic improvements and dramatic in the sense that not only has their target injury improved, but they've also noticed improvement in ancillary conditions that we really didn't set out to do anything about. So we've taken people with rotator cuff injuries and back problems and injected their shoulders and spine to try to fix the shoulder or back problem. And when the patients come back and follow up, they report to us that. Their kidney function has improved. Some of our patients have chronic kidney disease, which is another common ailment here in our demographic, and it's classified as, stage two, stage three, stage four. And when you get to stage five, you're pretty much on a dialysis machine and nobody wants to end up in that predicament. So I have several patients that have reported. That when they went to get their kidney function checked that their kidney function had improved, a month or so after they had received treatment for. So how long a shoulder.

Mike Roth: 39:23

How long would people be on these peptide treatments? Is it treatment for life like insulin or is it more like a thing that you're on for a month or two? and That's, and it's over.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 39:33

That's a great question, Mike, and I thank you for asking that. It again depends on the disease state. If we're trying to recover from an acute injury, something that we might have sustained.

Mike Roth: 39:42

Rotator cup or a or a knee injury, right?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 39:44

Rotator cuff, knee, wrist, ankle, you name it, there are a lot of sports related injuries that, that we see in the office. So those things will usually. Respond to a handful treatments, one, two, sometimes three treatments, and typically within six months to a year, if it's healable, it will have healed, and then the patient may no longer have to come for placental protein treatment. You have mentioned peptides. And peptides are another part of the regenerative equation. And the peptides basically are not new. They've been a around for decades and many people here use peptides. But again being an inquisitive sort who wants to offer something different what we have that's a game changer is the way to administer peptides. Peptides are small molecules that typically have very short half lives, meaning they're in and out of our system. They get broken down very quickly. And they are not absorbed well. So trying to ingest them is not usually fruitful.

Mike Roth: 40:51

So you think it as a pill?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 40:52

No. So historically, unfortunately because the American philosophy is there's a pill for everything, but they don't do very well that way. So historically people have gone to a medical office or infusion center and received I V administration of peptides. Okay. And not only is it a painful process for some, 'cause most people, most of my patients prefer not to be stuck with needles if there's a better alternative, it's very time consuming. Peptide infusions typically last a few hours. So three hours out of your day to sit there to get an IV drip is not fun. Peptides, as I said, are not new, but the route of administration is. So we have a novel route of administration that is patented and it is a prescription medical device. It's called Push Patch. And uses the scientific principle called iontophoresis to basically drive these peptides, which are either positively or negatively charged molecules through the skin and directly into the bloodstream.

Mike Roth: 41:54

So if you had a rotator cuff injury and you wanted to put the peptides on it, you would have a patch that you would put on a shoulder.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 42:02

Correct. You could apply the patch in the vicinity of an injury and the peptides come in different varieties. There peptides that are designed to modulate inflammation. There are peptides that are designed to to drive tissue repair and healing. There are peptides that are designed to provide our cells with energy because as we age the energy levels within our cells also declines rapidly. So if we can take something to keep our cells properly energized, it's like keeping the batteries charged and the peptides work in conjunction with the placental proteins to drive the healing process, forward. Good way. A nice way think of the placental proteins is that the placental proteins are like the key in the ignition that starts the vehicle. Peptide therapy is basically the fuel in the tank that keeps the engine or the keeps the car moving, keeps the whole healing vehicle moving forward, moving in the right direction.

Mike Roth: 43:06

Mark, if someone wants to learn more about your process. Is there a seminar or something that you do to inform the general public.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 43:15

Yes. Thank you for asking Mike. One of the big distinctions about MIT also is that we strive to educate our patients and physicians. Yes, we have regular seminars in the office, and they're usually bimonthly. Sometimes we have them on a weekly basis depending on the time of year and what the population is looking like here in Florida because things. Or a little bit seasonal in the Sunshine State.

Mike Roth: 43:40

Now Mark, if they wanted to contact your office, how do they do that?

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 43:44

Thank you, Mike. It's medical imaging and therapeutics, and we are in Lady Lake, Florida, and our telephone number is area code (352) 261-5502. Or you can reach out to us online at mitflorida.com.

Mike Roth: 44:05

Great. Thanks for joining us, mark.

Dr. Mark Jacobson: 44:06

Thank you very much, Mike. I appreciate it. it.

Dolores: 44:08

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